mummymantras

@ adidaem: Yeah... The lack of an actual store room was something I was concerned about as well actually. But my hubby points out that we've manage to do quite well so far (our current store room has nothing except some toiletries, a few suitcases, and a couple of rows of shoes in it). We're not the sort of people who like to collect clutter and I'm the kind of person who won't buy anything unless I'm absolutely sure that I'll use it almost every single day for the next 5 years at least (my hubby thinks I'm the stingiest woman that he's ever met!). The plan to turn the 'study' into the living room doesn't worry me too much. We don't have a big TV. On the contrary, we have a pretty small one... and we don't really use it all that often in any case. We don't watch a lot of TV. We read a lot! In fact, when we first got married and moved into our current flat (more than 9 years ago), we didn't have a TV until nearly a year after we had moved in! We simply didn't need it... But people who came to visit us kept on asking where our TV was (especially our parents), so eventually we just decided that we needed to be a bit more 'normal' and get a TV for our living room. We plan for our living room to be more of a reading space for us + play area for our kids. The TV is incidental to our plans... We can't retain anything from the current flat. When I say that it's in its "original condition", I'm not kidding! The current owner didn't even bother to install proper lights in the flat (she has cheap, naked lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling!), and she has the cheapest possible tiles on her floor (the kind that gets really sticky when you mop it!). There's no built-in furniture and no air-conditioners either. On the plus side, this all makes it far easier to renovate the place... A lot less things to remove.

Generally speaking, our home is going to be a bit of a challenge to any ID brave enough to take up the task of designing it... Here's what we are hoping for (the main points only - not the whole 3-page design brief!): • The Look: A cross between an independent bookstore and a boutique hotel (We have a huge collection of books and unique artworks which needs to take pride of place in our home. A sizeable bookwall to shelve this huge book collection is, therefore, a must and will serve as the primary design feature of our home. Planning where the various artworks in our collection should be placed is also crucial and their location must enhance the design aesthetic of our home.) • The Clients: The wife (freelance writer & editor, full-time mother of 2 young children, works entirely from home and does occasionally meet clients and project workmates at home), the husband (communications manager with a bank, devoted father of 2 young children, works from home a few days each week), the husband’s sister (an arts facilities manager, works long hours outside of the home and looks forward to relaxing at home after a hard day’s work), and 2 young children (the couple’s twin, 3-year-old daughters are sweet but mischievous pre-schoolers) • The Lifestyle: As we host large parties in our home quite frequently (we have a wide social circle), the open kitchen and dining area should take pride of place, as this is where guests tend to congregate and circulate. The kitchen, however, needs to be a child-friendly one – free of oddly protruding corners or sharp edges that might hurt a young child (we also have a lot of friends with little tykes of their own). Our family tends to spend most of our time either at the dining table (working, eating, playing with toys / colouring, talking, surfing the net, reading the papers, sharing a bottle of wine, etc.) or the kitchen (cooking, planning meals, washing the dishes, etc.). Therefore, the largest amount of space should be devoted to these 2 areas. The family goes to the living room far less often, and generally this space tends to be more of a play area for the children. • The Budget: $50,000 (We have a separate budget for standalone furniture / lights, appliances and electronic goods. In addition, we have a quite a significant amount of furniture, books and artworks from our previous home that we intend to retain and display in our new home.) Opinions anyone? Is this reasonable?

@ Jaskel: Thanks! We were lucky. And it was a low floor. And the previous owner was desperate - the property had been sitting unsold for 5 months! @ West: Can't wait for the journey to begin. My current home is beautiful, but only accidentally so. We couldn't afford an ID and could only hire a contractor to do the basics. Luckily, we have a fairly good eye for what matches and what doesn't!

Right now the flat is in its "original condition" (as property agents so quaintly like to put it). But, by the time we've gotten our hands on it, we hope to turn it into our dream home... After extensive discussion with the hubby, and drawing up a three-page design brief for our future ID (whoever that may be), I've come up with what I think is the most sensible layout to meet all our needs:

Anyway, enough talk... Here's the floorplan for our new place (built in 1998): I really like the fact that the kitchen walls can be mostly demolished (except for 1 small pillar) to create a large, open plan kitchen. And I like how WC2 has an access door that faces the 2 smaller bedrooms (such a smart idea on the part of HDB... I have no idea why they suddenly stopped doing this for later flats!).

Gosh, what a journey it has been! After viewing countless flats for sale in all sizes, configurations and locations, my hubby and I finally found our perfect home along Old Airport Road (or rather Cassia Crescent, to be more precise). The price was right (the valuation was a little high but the COV was a very modest $22K), the location is great (just a short walk from Mountbatten MRT station and the great food at Old Airport Rd Food Centre, and close to both town and the joys of the East Coast), the internal layout is great (finally we have a toilet that faces the bedrooms and NOT the kitchen!), and the flat gets a steady cool breeze from the east. The only catch (there always is one, isn't there...) is that we have to wait quite a while for the current owner to move out (she doing a complex contra deal, and can't move out till Decemeber). Oh well... Anyway, I figured that I might as well start my renoblog early and seek wisdom and advice from the reno veterans of this site.